AFGHANISTAN: Marja Offensive Aimed to Shape U.S. Opinion on War

Senior military officials decided to launch the current U.S.-British military campaign to seize Marja in large part to influence domestic U.S. opinion on the war in Afghanistan, the Washington Post reported Monday.

POLITICS: Air Strike on Civilians Reverberates Beyond Afghanistan

Amid growing European discontent over the war in Afghanistan, the head of U.S. and NATO forces apologised Monday for an air strike that killed at least 27 civilians in the central part of the country Sunday.

POLITICS: Jailed Taliban Leader Still a Pakistani Asset

Contrary to initial U.S. suggestions that it signals reduced Pakistani support for the Taliban, the detention of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the operational leader of the Afghan Taliban, represents a shift by Pakistan to more open support for the Taliban in preparation for a peace settlement and U.S. withdrawal.

US-PAKISTAN: Baradar Capture Signals Closer Intelligence Cooperation

The capture of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar last week in a joint operation conducted by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) represents the most important Taliban leader to be taken into custody since the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

U.S.: Mandated Oversight Missing in Afghan Contracts

Lack of oversight of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) contractors in Afghanistan is not a new story.

CANADA: Resistance Casts Pall over 2010 Olympic Festivities

The 2010 Winter Olympics opened with the largest protest convergence in the history of the Games.

AFGHANISTAN: Taliban Regime Pressed bin Laden on anti-U.S. Terror

Evidence now available from various sources, including recently declassified U.S. State Department documents, shows that the Taliban regime led by Mullah Mohammad Omar imposed strict isolation on Osama bin Laden after 1998 to prevent him from carrying out any plots against the United States.

POLITICS: Peace Talks May Follow Ex-Taliban Mediators’ Plan

If peace talks do ultimately begin between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the Taliban leadership, they may well follow a "road map" to a political settlement drawn up by a group of ex-Taliban officials who have been serving as intermediaries between the two sides.

AFGHANISTAN: Iraq Lessons Ignored at Kabul Power Plant

A diesel-fueled power plant, nearing completion just outside Kabul, demonstrates that the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and its contractors have failed to learn lessons from identical mistakes in Iraq, despite clearly signposted advice from oversight agencies.

POLITICS: US, Karzai Clash on Unconditional Talks with Taliban

On the surface, it would seem unlikely that Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who presides over a politically feeble government and is highly dependent on the U.S. military presence and economic assistance, would defy the United States on the issue of peace negotiations with the leadership of the Taliban insurgency.

U.S.: Obama Calls for More Development, Counterinsurgency Aid

U.S. President Barack Obama Monday called on Congress to approve major increases over the coming months in global health, development, and counterinsurgency assistance as part of a record 3.8-trillion-dollar 2011 federal budget.

AFGHANISTAN: US Night Raids and Secret Prisons Anger Civilians

An investigative report published on TomDispatch.com about U.S. forces' operations in Afghanistan paints a gruesome picture of surprise night raids, indiscriminate killing and random detention of civilians during those raids, as well as what appears to be widespread use of torture of Afghan detainees.

AFGHANISTAN: Officials’ Optimism on Economy Belies Deep Poverty

Afghanistan may be one of the poorest countries in the world, but official figures do not quite paint a picture of a country deep in the throes of poverty and underdevelopment.

U.S.: Obama Faces Increasingly Daunting Picture Overseas

While President Barack Obama's first State of the Union Address Wednesday night will almost certainly focus on the economy, unemployment, and other pressing domestic issues, an increasingly worrisome international situation is likely to be tugging at the back of his mind.

POLITICS: U.S. Taking New Tack on Afghan Poppies

Counter-narcotics and counterinsurgency often go hand-in-hand in Afghanistan, where the opium poppy trade bankrolls much of the Taliban's operations and greases political corruption.

POLITICS: Behind Cautious Signal, a Decision for Afghan Peace Talks

Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal's very cautiously-worded support for a negotiated settlement with the Taliban leadership in an interview published Monday is only the first public signal of a policy decision by the Barack Obama administration to support a political settlement between the Hamid Karzai regime and the Taliban, an official of McChrystal's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) command has revealed in an interview with IPS.

AFGHANISTAN: In Run-up to Meet, US, Britain Push Reconciliation

On the eve of a major international conference on Afghanistan, senior U.S. and British officials are hinting that they are more open to a political settlement with elements of the Taliban than at any time since Washington helped oust it from power nine years ago.

RIGHTS: U.S. Names Bagram Prisoners, Withholds Details

After years of stonewalling, the U.S. Defence Department has released the names of people imprisoned at the notorious Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan.

RIGHTS: British Govt to Release Documents on Gitmo Case

After months of denial, the British government has agreed to release secret documents that lawyers say could prove that MI5 agents were present during the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency's torture of a British resident held by the U.S. government for eight years.

U.S.: Suicide Rate Surged Among Veterans

Suicides among United States military veterans ballooned by 26 percent from 2005 to 2007, according to new statistics released by the Veterans Affairs (VA) department.

POLITICS: Okinawa Air Base a Thorn in U.S.-Japan Ties

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is traveling in the South Pacific this week on a trip to strengthen the longtime U.S. alliances with Australia, work to improve relations with New Zealand and to bring some forward momentum to U.S.-Japanese negotiations over the controversial relocation of the U.S. air station in Okinawa.